Portal:Reformed Christianity

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Reformed Christianity, also called Calvinism, is a major branch of Protestantism that began during the sixteenth-century Protestant Reformation, a schism in the Western Church. Today, it is largely represented by the Continental, Presbyterian, and Congregational traditions, as well as parts of the Anglican and Baptist traditions.

A foundational event that divided the Reformed from the Lutheran tradition occurred in 1529 when reformer Huldrych Zwingli of Zürich broke with Martin Luther on the topic of the Lord's Supper. A separate Reformed tradition developed over several generations, especially in Switzerland, France, Scotland and the Netherlands.

In the seventeenth century, Jacobus Arminius and the Remonstrants were expelled from the Dutch Reformed Church over disputes regarding predestination and salvation, and from that time Arminians are usually considered to be a distinct tradition from the Reformed. This dispute produced the Canons of Dort, the basis for the "doctrines of grace" or "five points" of Calvinism.

Reformed theology emphasizes the authority of the Bible, the sovereignty of God, and covenant theology, a framework for understanding the Bible based on God's covenants with people. Reformed churches have emphasized simplicity in worship. Several forms of ecclesiastical polity are exercised by Reformed churches, including presbyterian, congregational, and some episcopal. (Full article...)

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Huldrych Zwingli in an oil portrait from 1531 by Hans Asper; Kunstmuseum Winterthur.

Huldrych Zwingli (1 January 1484 – 11 October 1531) was a leader of the Reformation in Switzerland. Born during a time of rising Swiss patriotism and increasing criticism of the Swiss mercenary system, he attended the University of Vienna and the University of Basel, a scholarly centre of humanism. In 1519, Zwingli became the pastor of the Grossmünster in Zürich where he began to preach ideas on reforming the Church. The Reformation spread to other parts of the Swiss Confederation, but several cantons resisted, preferring to remain Roman Catholic. Zwingli formed an alliance of Reformed cantons which divided the Confederation along religious lines. Zwingli’s ideas came to the attention of Martin Luther and other reformers. They met at the Marburg Colloquy and although they agreed on many points of doctrine, they could not reach an accord on the doctrine of the presence of Christ in the Eucharist. In 1531 Zwingli’s alliance applied an unsuccessful food blockade on the Roman Catholic cantons. The cantons responded with an attack at a moment when Zürich was badly prepared. Zwingli was killed in battle at the age of 47. His legacy lives on in the confessions, liturgy, and church orders of the Reformed churches of today.

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Image 1The Parable of the Prodigal Son, depicted in a portrait by Rembrandt, illustrates forgiveness. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 2The Directory for Public Worship described what should (and shouldn't) occur in worship. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 3Fall of Man by Jacob Jordaens (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 4Calvin preached at St. Pierre Cathedral in Geneva. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 5The burning of the Guernsey Martyrs during the Marian persecutions in 1556 (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 6The Grote Kerk in Haarlem in the Dutch Republic, c. 1665 (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 7The Shield of the Trinity diagrams the classic doctrine of the Trinity. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 8Stephen Bocskai, leader of Hungarian Calvinists in the anti-Habsburg rebellion and first Calvinist prince of Transylvania (r. 1605–1606) (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 9A Reformed church in Koudekerk aan den Rijn in the Netherlands in the 19th century (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 10Dutch prime minister Abraham Kuyper initiated Neo-Calvinism. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 11Early Calvinism was known for simple, unadorned churches as depicted in this 1661 portrait of the interior of the Oude Kerk, Amsterdam (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 12The seal of the Presbyterian Church in the United States of America, an early American Presbyterian church founded in 1789 (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 13Moses Amyraut formulated Amyraldism, a modified Calvinist theology regarding the nature of Jesus' atonement. (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 14Statues of William Farel, John Calvin, Theodore Beza, and John Knox, influential theologians in developing the Reformed faith, at the Reformation Wall in Geneva (from Reformed Christianity)
Image 15John Calvin depicted on his deathbed with church members in The last moments of Calvin, a late 19th century portrait by Lluís Domènech i Montaner (from Reformed Christianity)

Did you know...

... that the design of the Third Presbyterian Church in Springfield, Ohio, may have been patterned after the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem?

...that the early American minister Francis Doughty had a proclivity for witch-hunting?

...that John Duncan, a Scottish Presbyterian theologian and missionary, was affectionately known as "Rabbi", due to his knowledge of Hebrew and his passion for the Jewish people?

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